Eco (Atlantic) Oil & Gas Ltd and its partnering company Tullow Oil have elected to enter Phase Two of the Initial Period under the Petroleum Agreement and Prospecting Licence, Orinduik Block, offshore Guyana.
In Guyana, Eco Guyana holds a 40 per cent working interest alongside Tullow Oil (60 per cent) in the 1,800 km2 Orinduik Block in the shallow water of the prospective Suriname Guyana basin.
As announced on 26 September 2017 however, Eco signed an agreement with Total E&P Activités Pétrolières, a wholly owned subsidiary of Total SA (“Total”), whereby Total has an option to acquire a 25 per cent Working Interest in the Orinduik Block from Eco Guyana.
The Orinduik Block is adjacent and updip to the deep-water Liza Field, recently discovered by ExxonMobil and Hess, which is estimated to contain as much as 2.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent, making it one of a handful of billion-barrel discoveries in the last half-decade.
Eco Atlantic in a release said that the operator of the block, Tullow Oil has notified the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) as well as Natural Resources Minister, Raphael Trotman of their decision.
According to Eco oil “the work commitment under Phase Two requires the acquisition of at least a minimum of 1,000 square kilometers of 3D seismic on the Orinduik Block. This has already been completed and exceeded during Phase One when the Block partners completed a 2,550 square kilometers survey in September 2017. As such, there is no further 3D seismic in Phase Two of the Initial Exploration Period.”
Eco’s Chief Operating Officer Colin Kinley said that his company’s “entry into Phase Two further endorses our belief of the potential of the Orinduik Block.”
He noted too that their impetus for going into Phase Two has also recently been strengthened by ExxonMobil’s sixth discovery on the adjacent Stabroek Block, Ranger-1, which now increases Exxon’s estimated total of more than 3.2 billion recoverable oil-equivalent barrels on the Block.
